The Heart of a Starchild
by Chris Walker
Summary: Warwick, a savage creature born from perverse science and alchemy, uses his abilities to rid the streets of Zaun of crime, if only to curb his murderous instincts and to make up for the sins he made when he was still a man. Upon hunting down one such criminal to the island nation of Ionia and suffering grievous injuries from the fight, he is found and cared for by a kindly being.
1. Chapter 1: The Vicious and the Kind

Blood.

The rich, wonderful, and unmistakable smell of blood filled Warwick's keen nose with its delicious scent. The scent that made his heart pound within his chest in a manner that seemed like it would burst with its vigor. His once yellow eyes now showed like red, hellish embers within the sockets of his skull. His black lips were raised and peeled back, showing his white, bared fangs for all to see with his snarl. And this was all because he was nearing in on the one man he had spent so agonizing long hunting.

For the greatest while had the Blood Hunter tracked this particular chem-baron from outside the polluted and corrupt landscape that was the city of Zaun. Knowing the feared Howler was on his tail the chem-baron had fled to Ionia, a peaceful, but by no means undefended island nation across the sea. He did so by boarding the first ship he could get on, leaving the bestial vigilante and would-be killer behind on dry land.

Not that it stopped Warwick from pursuing his prey.

For one whole day and one whole night Warwick swam across the choppy, salty ocean water that separated Ionia from the continent of Valoran. Without tire he broke through the coming waves and continued his chase, all for the want of sinking his sharpened fangs into that chem-baron's wretched throat. The occasional shark or other underwater predator would be drawn up to the surface by his partially-canid silhouette, hoping to make a meal of him. Their hunger and curiosity was met with a gruesome end at the chimera's struggling claws and jaws, or else fled to seek out other, less well-defended prey.

Warwick was nearing total exhaustion when he reached land. But the hunt, still on, beckoned him to continue. Shaking the saltwater off of himself, he left the shore in a swift few bounds and entered the forest dwelling beyond it without a care for his well being; the scent of his prey so near now, he could practically taste him.

He traversed through the wilds of the foreign place, not stopping for even a second to gaze at any section of the beautiful, untouched landscape surrounding every step he took. Not stopping to realize just how different it was from the smoggy and befouled world of rampant technology and mad alchemy he knew as Zaun. After another several hours of traveling without rest he finally located his prey calmly walking along a dirt path, blissfully unaware of his coming fate until a bloodcurdling howl erupted from Warwick's fanged maw.

The look of sheer, unexpected surprise and terror shining in his glassy eyes brought a rotten sense of pleasure to the chimera, but it was pleasure nonetheless. Even without the repugnant scent he left, Warwick would have known from sight alone that he was a Zaunite and definitely not an Ionian. His body was more a walking pile of whirring, perverted and dark machinery than flesh, and what little of it there was that wasn't metal was large, rippling muscle, lined with thick and exposed veins alight with a sickly green glow, indicating their strength was granted alone by the foul chemical steroids his kind were known and made infamous for producing.

Though he was caught off guard, the chem-baron was far from defenseless. Upon witnessing Warwick's coming lunge he had drawn his weapon, a great sword, electrically charged by a small generator running along its hilt. Small sparks crackled along its top, and soon over fur and flesh as the device pierced the Howler's thick, scar-covered hide with a huge swing that would have easily felled a normal man.

Alas for the chem-baron, Warwick was a man no longer. He was something more now, but also something less. And if there was anything he was made for, it was pure and simple slaughter. Though at first letting out a hurt whimper from the impact of the blow, the noise was swiftly replaced by a roar.

Warwick swiped and bit, clawed and bellowed. With his wicked talons of metal and natural making he tore open the chem-baron's steel body as though it were tin, and with his powered sword the chem-baron cut a savage gash that wrenched off a hunk of flesh from Warwick's abdomen. The struggle was intense and fierce, and much blood, metal parts, and chem fluid was spilled upon the plants and ground of the once-tranquil area. In the end Warwick won the dispute by ripping open the cruel machine-man's throat with his fangs, finally spelling his deserved doom.

Seeing nothing but red from the amount of pain he had endured and blood he had smelled and tasted, the chimera was far from done with his foe. Even as the chem-baron was entering his helpless death throes, Warwick brutally assaulted his body with the tenacity of a maddened dog, ignoring his unbound exhaustion and the wretched wounds he had accrued in favor of taking his misery and wrath out upon it.

Warwick did not feel the true pain that the wounds themselves entailed until he finally finished beating, tearing, and gnawing at what little remained of the chem-baron. Finally regaining as much control of his bestial self as he could a great many minutes later, he spat out a chunk of twisted metal and gore in his teeth, wiped the blood from his mouth with the back of his left arm, and stood up, panting hard and occasionally coughing up a wad of crimson saliva from his torn insides. Placing a claw down to his lower side, he felt the gaping and bleeding wound ripped into his body. Not only was there the fiery agony, but also grogginess from the amount of stamina he had exerted throughout the beginning of the trek, all the way from Zaun's shore to this one. And yet, through it all, there was an overwhelming sense of satisfaction that tickled his battered brain like a soft feather. The chem-baron tried so hard to escape him, but now he was as dead as a doornail.

Dead, dead, _dead!_ Oh, how the gruesome words sounded so lovely to him now! One more rancid, ruling chem-baron taken permanently off the streets! One more criminal facing proper justice at his claws and teeth! One more hunt fulfilled, nice and neat!

Warwick repeated these words like a demented song, or at least words similar to it within his feverish mind as he began limping away. His injuries were grievous, but with all the rancid chemicals burning through his veins, he would heal from them. He just needed to find a place of as much comfort as he could experience. A place where he could rest and recuperate. And so, for nearly an hour afterward, he lurched forth through the woodland of Ionia, searching for a place to lay down and properly recover. As he entered one area that seemed nice and uninhabited, which to say was what appeared to be a grove of sorts, a strange noise suddenly came into his large ears.

It sounded like a... pipe-related instrument. Not the chiming of workplace machinery and factories that constantly made an awful, loathsome ruckus back in Zaun, but something soft. Soothing. It was some time later that he finally remembered what the name of the instrument possibly making it. A _flute_.

The melody took a hold of Warwick's mind, and before he knew it he was lying upon the grassy ground of the grove, struggling to stay awake. He quickly lost the battle with the music and his weary mind, and so, with a hint of reluctance in his lowering eyelids, he slowly faded into unconsciousness and knew no more.

* * *

Blood.

The thick, metallic, and unmistakable smell of blood filled the clear air like a foul pollutant infecting the enchanted, precious and sacred grove one particular individual called her home. Lifting her head as soon as she detected the scent, Soraka took the lip plate of her wooden flute from her mouth and paused her performance; the choir of birds in the trees overhead suddenly going silent. The horrid smell was thick and fresh, and somewhere close by. Her grove was a place of shelter and respite, and if she ever found herself with company, it was normally in the form of the wounded and sick who sought her out to cure their terminal maladies.

Soraka stood from her log seat to her feet and began walking hurriedly through her grove to locate the source of this disturbance. The celestial being herself bore a form not unlike that of a human woman, possessing long, black, tied hair that fell from the back of her head, and pallid skin etched in tattoo-like markings that seemed to radiate with mystic power. Currently, she was cloaked in an extensive and dark blue dress at her base that hid her legs and feet completely away within its fold, while the manner of clothing around her upper body was covered in a light, and somewhat regal type of reddish Ionian regalia, with several symbols on it representing the stars from whence she came so long ago. In her hands, having picked it up as she left, was the celestial staff she owned that had the golden symbol of the moon at its tip, and served occasionally as a conduit for her magical skill when using her hands to process it wasn't enough. A mere minute had passed when she finally discovered who she was seeking, and when she laid her eyes upon it, they widened slightly in shock.

Breathing in ragged gasps that gave away how hurt it was, was a great beast far larger than she was, possessing dark fur all over its muscular and battered body. It had the basic form of a canid being, mixed with some form of humanoid, and had a variety of unnatural machinery augmented into itself, running mostly along its spine and actually within its right arm. From its rear, which was covered in the remains of an old and dreadfully worn pair of brown pants, extended a long, bushy tail, resembling that of a fox's. On either side of its head, its ears were exceptionally large and pointed, as a bat would have. He, as Soraka quickly assumed, was a creature the likes of which she had never seen.

And he was horribly, horribly wounded.

Soraka, without hesitation, approached the being and stared down at him with an expression of pity. Holding her staff close, she knelt to the ground to get a better view of the area on him that was bleeding the most. While descending to her knee, the base of her long, flowing dress settled over the terrain like an ocean's water spreading over a neighboring shore. It didn't take her long to locate the source of his worst laceration, which to say was a gaping, torn-open spot of flesh on his abdomen - clearly given in a fight and not gained by some form of accident. Without hesitation, her thin arms extended and her hands grew close to the wound; their still fingertips glowing in a greenish tint. The moment that she touched him, the beast let out a wicked snarl and unconsciously swiped his left claw forward, striking it across Soraka's shoulder.

But it did not harm her. Soraka was a Starchild - an immortal being, and one who had lived her life for the sole purpose of healing others. Lest she performed a deed that brought intentional harm to another, she would remain as she was. Enduring the blow that could effortlessly rend flesh from bone, instead of being sliced into bloody ribbons, her limb remained intact as it was and she felt nothing. She scarcely flinched from the lightning-quick reaction to her soft touch to begin with, and had on a face only showing sorrow for the creature's plight.

Soraka's fingers once more pressed forward until they again touched the bleeding edge of his wound. The beast snarled again as he felt something alien and soft come over him, but as a brief few seconds passed, his growling turned into a long, slow whine from the soothing sensation swirling through his otherwise inactive mind.

Focusing, Soraka closed her eyes and silently called upon the stars to aid her. Channeling her magic, she directed it out of her hands in a greenish stream and onto the body of the creature, restoring what was lost and sealing what had been torn and sundered. Within the span of a dozen seconds, the red trail of blood flowing from his body ceased and the mortal-looking injury was mended; restored in a way that left it looking like it hadn't been damaged to begin with. Not a single scar remained where there had once been a series of nasty gashes. Her work done and newest guest cured of his horrible ailments, Soraka was satisfied.

Picking up her celestial staff and using it to get back from her knees to her legs, she walked over to the front of the creature and sat down by his head. With hands moving as gentle as possible, she lifted his head and moved herself under it, then allowed it to fall over her warm lap. "You are not from here, are you?" she tenderly whispered to the being, leaning her staff over her shoulder with one hand as the other stroked the fur over his scarred face. "You poor creature. There is no need to fret now, for you are safe here. All who dwell within my grove are safe from injury, and you, even through such a fear-inspiring visage, are as well."

Sitting there the ground of her grove, with the beast's great head propped over her lap, Soraka let the once-ailing creature sleep peacefully; hoping only that his dreams were pleasant after the ordeal he must have gone through. To help him along with that, Soraka began to hum a song. It was a lullaby she had learned from a desperate mother nearly one-hundred years before, when she had brought forth her sick child to be cured by the Starchild. She remembered hearing the mortal woman use it to rock her baby to sleep in her arms, and Soraka saw it now as a perfect way to ensure that this beast got his own deserved rest.

In the end, Soraka spent a grand and long while singing to her visitor. She stayed with him through the entire day, even as the sun set and the moon, shaped in a thin white crescent, rose high in the black sky; a black sky riddled from one horizon to the other in glittering stars. Stars that seemed to shine down upon their child with a sense of pride.


	2. Chapter 2: A Healer's Care

Unconsciousness only just beginning to leave him, the first thing Warwick could discern from reality and his dreamless slumber was a heavenly warmth that overcame every nerve in his body. It was a warmth that settled over him like a wonderful fleece draped over his hide. Comforting him in a manner longer and greater than he could ever hope to remember. His tongue rolled about within his closed, saliva-rich mouth, moving over his fangs and across the interior of his black lips.

He could detect something else. It was a sound. A voice. A _song_ ; a beautiful, beautiful song hung around his ears, filling his half-conscious mind with its grace. Filling it with images. Images of the past. Memories.

 _Memories._

Warwick knew all too well of the only memories his mind was able to keep after his transformation. Fear and hatred took hold of his body at the idea of remembering those forsaken times. He wanted to forget them all. He wanted to forget his time spent on the operating table. Being carved and cut into, the metal augmentations that replaced many of his bones, being injected with every alchemical ingredient meant to cause pain and acting as nothing more than a guinea pig for that damned mad chemist who made him into this. At last, the images he so greatly loathed to reimagine faded before he could truly experience them.

The song, however, seemed to notice his growing tension. It grew in volume, replacing his anxiety. The hum of that angelic voice soothed every muscle in the chimera's mutated form. A moan left his mouth as he felt himself relax, the last of his worry leaving him like a departing storm.

His eyes opened at last, and a faint ray of sunlight was the first sight to greet them. Getting used to the gleam, he realized that there was a shape looming over him, cloaked in a dress of sorts. It looked female. It looked human. Her skin, pallid as snow, was highlighted in marks imprinted upon her that resembled curling celestial symbols. Smooth, raven-black hair fell finely from her head, and Warwick eventually came to the realization that one of her hands was stroking at the fur on the side of his neck in a tender motion. It accompanied the song that emerged from her lips in a fluent motion, matching it splendor in every fathomable way.

And her eyes... her eyes were something else entirely. Something inhuman; golden and beguiling. Half-open, they stared down at him, into his own. Compared to the rest of what he saw in her so far, they looked like a pair of glittering stars in a sky of infinite void and blackness. He found himself getting blissfully lost in them as she ran her wandering hand over his forehead until it ventured behind both of his ears, getting at the perfect spot where a scar lay which he often spent many an hour itching at. With her gentle touch, any ailment he possessed, major or minor, seemed to... vanish.

For a time, Warwick simply stared into her calm, otherworldly eyes and at the impossibly warm smile she possessed. He didn't know how to react to this sort of situation in the slightest. Was it fear that clenched at his mind as he gazed upon this unperturbed being? Anger? No... the alien feeling of all his negative emotions having left him was far, far too clear to ignore. Was it... _pleasure?_ No, it couldn't have been that either. Were he to have ever felt something like that ever again without it being given during or after a rush of blood and violence, the unnatural chimera probably would have just sprung up onto his feet, unleashed a bellowing roar at her and then flee the scene. And yet, with the vexingly delightful sensation of her hand stroking the fur around his face and snout as the other cradled his head upon her lap... he felt heavily inclined to resist the action. And for a time he did.

After what seemed like an eternity of vacuous ecstasy, the strange individual who cared for Warwick so ungrudgingly stopped singing and instead spoke. "Those wounds you possessed were fairly gruesome to observe. I managed to mend them with my power, so you should feel as good as new now," she whispered in a tone as soft as down, and one that felt to Warwick like a wonderful, rare beam of sunlight falling upon his body on a cold day in Zaun's smog-infested streets. Still paralyzed by his conflicted mind, all he could do was emit a long and high pitched whine that ended in a sigh.

"How curious it is for someone like you to visit my grove, really," she came again. "You resemble a creature with great intelligence, but I do not know that for sure. I wonder, can you speak?"

"Sp-sp- _speak?_ " Warwick found himself having to form enough willpower just to talk. His voice itself was low and guttural to the point that it sounded more like an animalistic growl, but still the being above him remained unmolested. "I... I can speak."

"So you can," she chuckled, the laugh itself mirthful and filled with nothing but happiness. Its insidious effects were like the enthralling song from before; it forced out a sense of gratification that burned within Warwick's chemical-infused blood to match the excruciating level of agony granted by fiery pitch. "How very interesting this is. And how very fortunate for you to have stumbled into my domain. You looked minutes away from meeting the Eternal Hunters, given those injuries you possessed. You were out of it for a day and a night."

However dulled his senses were, Warwick noticed at last that his physical pain was truly gone. It was either his biology's doing, or this being's mentioned magic that had done it. Either way, Warwick also noticed that for this he cared not. This place was not his own. He knew, for all the treatment he had received, that he had to leave. Of course, such an action had to start with him sitting up and getting a better grip on things.

When he finally gained the fortitude to perform the deed upon sucking in a deep breath of the fresh air around him, he did so, albeit sluggishly. He shut his eyes, clenching their lids together tightly against the sting of the dry rheum that had gathered between them while he slept. Grunting, he rolled himself off of her lap and landed upon his rump, inhaling a deep breath while his tail swished about where it extended behind him with new life.

The winsome healer slowly rose to her feet to join him, her shape still quite small compared to the creature simply sitting before her. "My name is Soraka. Who, or what, are you, if I may ask?" Her voice was innocently curious, and Warwick heard the question well enough. She went on, "Though I have a theory, I have never seen any creature with quite a resemblance to you before."

Warwick was quiet for a moment, as though thinking deeply on this query. "I... am a monster," he eventually growled. His eyes traveled down to the metal claws sticking from the flesh of his fingers on his right arm, and he stared at them long and hard; knowing just how far the metal within the bone there went. Knowing of the tortuous pain it constantly gave off that he had to get used to, after repeated attempts to violently rip the metal from his augmented limb manually proved futile. "That is what you should know me as. That is all I am. That was what I was created to be. And that is what I will die as."

Soraka's brow lowered skeptically, an easy smile snaking upon her lips. "Nobody is born a _monster_. Surely you were not." The bottom of her staff dug around in the soil below it as she twisted it around in her grasp. "Who were you before you so rashly declared yourself as such a twisted thing? A warrior? An artist? Surely you were not always what you claim to be..."

"Do not presume for a second that you even _think_ you know who I was. I have no reason to tell you a single thing," he argued, snapping the words at her. "What I am now is a beast that stalks a place far from here. My prey is the corrupt and the vile. And I _hunt_ them. That's all that matters to me."

"You only hunt those you see as cruel and foul?" Soraka inquired once more. "So, you see yourself as a being of vengeance, then?"

"One could... say that I am," he agreed, uneasy as it was with the character who had, thus far, refused to give off even a hint of intimidation by how he looked and sounded. He turned his shoulder to her, his left ear twitching twice in annoyance at her prying antics. "As I said, I am not from here. I live in a place ruled by scum. I am the only force there that... _cares_ enough to do anything about it. To bring... _justice_ to those who deserve it."

"Your 'justice' is to hunt them? _S_ _laughter_ them?" Soraka's fingers wrapped a little tighter around her staff, a note of slight disturbance clinging to her words.

"It is better for the likes of them to bear the brunt of my savagery more than anyone else," Warwick responded, his hazy memory going back to the kills he committed in the not so distant past. "The only people I ever want to kill are them. I won't hurt the ones who have done nothing wrong, if I can help it. I lose myself the moment I smell the blood of the guilty. It's like... _something_ gnawing at my brain, telling me to tear apart everything around me. Sometimes... sometimes I go into a frenzy."

Soraka processed all this with a hum, still seeing no reason to despise him. She tried to place her hand upon the chimera's shoulder in a friendly gesture, but he quickly pulled it away from her. Quietly sighing, she only looked his way with deep thoughts circulating in her mind until she released them.

"Even before you told me this, I knew you are not native to this place. Though your outward appearance is uncanny to theirs, I know you are not a member of the vastaya," she decided to speak next, making mention of the secretive people living in of Ionia whose ancestral ties left them with a mixture of animalistic features. "The truth is... that you were a man once, weren't you?" The second Warwick heard this question, his face snapped to his healer in a vicious glare and he snarled aloud. This instantly told Soraka that she was correct in her assumption, otherwise he might not have given off as upset of a visage as this.

His claws anxiously curling into his palms until they dug into the soft flesh there, the chimera stormed up to the Starchild with quick and purposeful steps while she in turn simply stood there unflinchingly. He stared down at her, teeth bared, a growl reverberating from within his throat and a look of red-eyed murder adorning his expression. In turn, she calmly looked up to him with no fear on hers. It was when Warwick's wrathful visage started to fade back into what it was before when he spoke once more. "I _was_ a man. A man who did _wretched_ things. A man who could never run from the sins he committed when he tried. And after that man became who I am, I _killed_ him first!"

The sound of the roar he used to end his sentence was loud enough to startle several birds sitting in the tops of the green trees surrounding them from within the grove, and their little, colorful forms tweeted in panic as they fled from the area. Soraka watched them fly off with a lowered brow, keeping her composure and waited patiently for silence to return before speaking again. Warwick's heavy breathing was the only sound going out now, but it, too, soon halted.

"I will let you leave, if that is what you wish. Should you ever find yourself in Ionia again, hurt or otherwise, I will be here," she said to him. "I truly hope our pathways cross again. I would like to get to know a _person_ like you more. I honestly do."

Warwick would have none of her blandishments. "Bah!" he could not help but puff, waving an uncaring claw her way from behind his back. "I'm not so much a person as I am an _animal_. Save your honeyed breath for another passerby who gives a damn for it..."

His tail flicking as he moved away from her the final time, Warwick began to depart. Quickly falling onto all fours and breaking into a bounding pace, he abandoned the grove and the strange, kind being who resided within it. Soraka watched him leave, unworried by his harsh words. As a matter of fact, that smile on her face seemed even more radiant than before. Knowing he was gone, and with the birds returning to their places in the trees they were once scared from, she began to return to the denser folds of her sacred territory. But as she left, a peculiar, hopeful thought tickled her brain.

Somehow, a part of her knew he would return. Somehow, that odd creature would come and visit her grove once again; his reasons for inevitably doing so unknown to the Starchild, but the truth all to clear to her. Somehow he would come back to her, and murmuring a chuckle to herself, she could hardly wait for it.

Somehow...

* * *

Upon arriving to the sand-laden beach and the glimmering blue ocean he once emerged from, Warwick took a final look at the land he traversed through. On his way back here he paid the Ionia's features some mind, but only just barely more than before. He thought to them for a few seconds, admiring them as well as he possibly could, and then entered the briny waters before him. With great and reinvigorated strokes, he began swimming. It took as long to traverse as when he crossed it in search for his prey, perhaps even longer due to lacking a quarry to pursue. Either way, the time it took to cross the sea paid off for him, for eventually, after a day and a night of treading water, the chimera reached the murky shores his home.

Quickly leaving the machinery-plagued coast, Warwick entered the thick city in its fullest. Lurking, leaping, and otherwise sneaking through its shadows, he could see that Zaun was still the infested cesspool he freshly remembered it being. Having clambered upon a tall-standing house to get a better view of his surroundings, he took in a deep breath of its fume-filled air. Its towers were tall and its streets were filled to their overcrowded brim with pedestrians; workers; marketeers, both honest and otherwise; cutthroats-for-hire and good-for-nothing scoundrels aplenty.

From its largest factory's tallest, purple smoke-spewing chimney stack, to its smallest and most lifeless (though at times lively) green puddle laying near the drainpipes of its most uninhabited district, it was Zaun. It was all its outside reputation was, and more. Ruled by the corrupt and given life by the downtrodden or ambitious, Zaun was a one of a kind place in the already wide and rough world of Runeterra. Had he not been the wrathful vigilante he was, it would not have been Warwick's first choice for locale. But its familiarity to him was... enough.

Eventually dropping down from the building and traveling further onward, Warwick soon reached the location that led to his home. It was a large, crusty, white-tinted pipeline that formed an entrance to the sewer, sitting in between one of the many local dumps and a bakery that had been built who-knows-how-many years back. With caution in his movement, he slunk inside before anyone could claim to have witnessed the dreaded 'Howler' - one of many great and terrible names he had been given since gaining notoriety for his deeds. A few dozen meters of walking through knee-high sludge later, he reached his den held within the sewer's labyrinthine depths. His home, if he dared even call it that.

Aside from being constructed on dry ground that went above the gunk his feet currently traipsed through, his abode was nothing special. Carved deep into the brick-laden wall, its quarters were rather cramped for a large creature such as he. Pieces of random scrap and junk he had collected over the long months, equally from his victims and the trash, littered the den at random like ruined trophies. He had enough intelligence to form a bed from the more comfortable parts he stole or gained from the scrap-pile, but that was its biggest feature by far.

Drying off his rear paws, he entered the lair, pushing aside that which was in his way until he reached and collapsed upon his bed. He felt weary from his travel from Ionia to here, and for right now, he wanted nothing more than to sleep. But no matter how weary he was, it just barely escaped his grasp. To aid him in it, he tried to imagine something pleasant. Something to soothe him. And the first image to pop up that matched that description was when he was under the care of the strange, magically-attuned woman from that odd, peaceful grove; Soraka, he delightfully remembered her name being.

His thoughts drifting to it, to that wondrous moment when he laid upon her lap as she sung to him, he soon and finally fell into a deep sleep.


	3. Chapter 3: Cunning Concoctions

The so-called 'Mad Chemist' known only as Singed was, for the moment, in a very contemplative mood. Over his willowy and fragile-looking body was an old, thin coat of a dark texture, a plain shirt that laid underneath it, long trousers, and, lastly of deserving notice, a pair of simple, but thick boots covered his feet.

With heavy steps in his stride upon the road leading up to it, he eventually came to and opened a thick metal door sitting before him and entered his main laboratory, hidden away within the deepest, most desolate and lightless recesses of Zaun. It was from here where he practiced all of his demented sciences with zeal and efficiency. The lab itself bore the mien of a large, grim and dimly-lit room, its floors made of aged wood and walls of dense, faded-red brick. To the alchemist, it was a place of beauty. Beakers, vials, distillation flasks, and other assorted sets and chem-tech filled with perverse chemicals of nearly every imaginable color rested at seemingly every corner.

The many glass objects bubbling with the chemicals they were infused with, Singed walked casually past them all and approached a small cabinet that a rack filled with unused vials sat upon. Opening its topmost drawer, he sifted through it for but a moment before getting what he wanted. What he pulled out were some old scraps of paper, their surfaces filled with detailed notes and sketches. He had kept these around for some time, and quite often he liked to look at them and ponder on the unconscionable deeds they entailed.

As of right now, they also served as a way to prepare for the future. The Mad Chemist ran a bony hand over his mouth as he cast a pensive stare toward his old notes. Strips of loosened and scarred flesh occasionally poked through the bandages he wrapped around it; a side effect from the numerous times he ingested his own potions and experimented on himself. Improving upon his human flaws till few remained.

All the countless tests he had run on his own body had taken their toll as the years drew on. His skin had long since turned rubbery and pale. His head, once as filled with hair in his youth as nearly any other, was smooth and bald. Save for the minuscule black dots that were his pupils, his eyes bore an unhealthy impression; his left one actually exuding a sickly green glow. Even his lean figure was queer in shape, giving him the appearance of an excessively thin and gaunt individual, though deception was ripe in his build. From his rancid and unethical concoctions he had gained not only a prolonged life, but strength, endurance and dexterity extending far beyond that of a normal human's natural bounds.

Of course, Singed rarely ever disclosed that sort of information to those he knew. No, he much preferred to have his opponents on both the work and battlefield underestimate him. Though by selling and lending his works and expertise to others had granted him immense fame that had the potential to give his rivals a chance at sneaking around his carefully-placed defenses, he still kept his greatest potions and brews for himself; chiefest among them, and the one he bestowed his most pride in creating, being his aptly-named 'insanity potion'.

But now was not the time to reflect on his most flawless achievements. Now was the time to reflect on what was perhaps his greatest failure - and success. Placing the papers upon a clear spot atop the cabinet so he could view them all at once, his eyes scanned over each and every one of them, his mind going back to when he first created the documents.

Long ago Singed had a thug of some sound conviction under his employ. He was a former gangster who would often go out on his orders to bring him specimens from around the world. The man eventually quit his services after a few years of carrying out the deranged alchemist's will, apparently having wanted to settle down and find a new purpose in life. Seeing no more use in a helper who wanted to willingly aid him in his tasks no longer, Singed decided to... _grant_ that new purpose to his former underling. He had, twinkling in his clouded eyes, one particular experiment he had been working for weeks on, and to do it in the first place, he required a fresh, warm, live body to operate on. A body of a good man. A body few would miss if it were to disappear from public eye.

After encountering and apprehending him with little effort, Singed brought him to his old lab and began. Strapping him down upon his operating table, he performed what could only be viewed as unspeakable deeds upon his sufferer. He did what every good alchemist sought to do, and conducted transmutations - albeit upon the man. With the aid of the chemicals he had grown used to using throughout his whole life, he changed the very flesh that the man possessed to resemble that of the aspects of various creatures, specifically taking their known talents and leaving their weaknesses. As if the effects after this weren't horrific enough, Singed surgically augmented him with pneumatic claws with great patience in his strokes, even as the limb he had cut off to do so regenerated, growing back and over the prosthetic (an unnecessary, but not unwelcome outcome). Installing a chemical chamber on his back and integrating it into his nervous system, he added pumps and hoses onto and into his form that would aid in the process of delivering them to his bloodstream; to force out the greatest of his anger and savagery.

Most of all the various things he put into the once-man was _pain_. Pain was the catalyst that held his work together and gave it purpose. With its aid, by the end, Singed successfully reached his goal of bringing out the deadly beast resting within every good man. It was just as he was adding the cherry on top of his grotesque masterpiece that the strained life of the creature the man had become suddenly gave out. During an attempt to escape, his heartbeat stopped, and upon uttering a name Singed tried hard to remember from the rush of it all, his final breath was given. Disappointed, Singed hastily disposed of the corpse in Zaun's Sump.

But, as what had been going on since then and well into present day could attest to, things were rarely as they seemed at the time when he got rid of his supposed failure. As he was away on business in the warlike, power-obsessed nation of Noxus, he eventually returned to find his old lab had been thoroughly trashed, no less than the night prior to his arrival. The culprit left behind a swathe of destruction that spared none of his old equipment, some still bearing claw marks that could only have been given by something of metal. Those marks, combined with other evidence it had left behind, gave Singed the answer he wanted: His subject had survived after all and was now on the loose in Zaun.

Months had passed since then, and evidence of his creation's doings were very frequent. And _very_ bloody. Disreputable criminals of any rank, high-profile chem-barons and notorious kingpins alike had become prey for his roving claws and jaws, as detailed in the city's news. Sometimes, the grisly pieces of whatever was left of them after their passing were in such poor condition that the law officials were unable to even fully identify the remains, if at all. Their only clue to who did all this were the sounds of howling and the occasional sighting of a hairy beast witnesses stated to hear or see before each act of carnage was committed.

Singed knew it was his experiment responsible for their deaths, somehow. He connected the dots. The viciousness... the tenacity... the drive to kill... these feats were all he had hoped to see bloom in his work and more. While troublesome in the long haul due to the oh-so little fact that he wasn't under his or anyone else's control, it impressed Singed to no end. As did the sheer level of terror the scum of the city began to feel following these repeated, _planned_ attacks. Yes, Singed also noticed that the beast still had a man's mind, however little of it there probably was, and interestingly enough, the more innocent of individuals seemed curiously unscathed by any form of assault from the murderous antics of his abomination.

Eventually, the Mad Chemist grew tired of setting his mind upon his greatest conundrum for the moment, thinking to put his mind back to use crafting his potent products. He put the papers away in the drawer from whence they came, closing it with an audible squeak of the old hinges attached to its aged wood. He turned his focus now onto a nearby station and the chemicals held there, thinking of crafting an advanced formula for clarity that an associate of his had requested from him not a day ago. He brought out a few alchemical ingredients and tools and began to work on it with passion in his fluid movements.

"Mix, mix, swirl, mix," he said to himself in a steady rhythm, his deep, smooth voice keeping in tone with his meticulous brewing. "Mix, mix, swirl, mix."

* * *

Red as a glowing, irradiated cherry fruit in the polluted atmosphere of Zaun, the sun rose enough for its full celestial body to be witnessed. If only just barely observable from the clouds that surrounded it, it signaled morning had come at last. Though its light failed to grace the dank interior of his den, Warwick, unleashing a mighty yawn from his great jaws as his body stirred, awoke with it. Getting up with a creak of his stiffened muscles and metal parts protruding from his body, he stretched himself out and prepared for the day. Knocking the last of his weariness from himself, the unnatural beast left his home and moved to Zaun's teeming surface.

The City of Iron and Glass never rested, even for a moment. As he slunk throughout the darker corners of it, Warwick could see the life it possessed in its fullest. Men and women of all ages trudged off from the Slums to the degrading factories from which they toiled out their menial lives. Seeking attention, up-and-coming thugs butted their thick heads against each other like rams vying for the attention of an ewe while the professionals flaunted their tech-augmented bodies to all who saw them. The delinquent youth of the city, so-called the 'Lost Children of Zaun', performed their rebellious antics that only went as far as defacing public property or snatching purses from the rich and cruel - far too young and their crimes far too innocent or insignificant for Warwick to even consider extending his wrath upon.

But for this morning, he had not intentionally come to exact his usual vengeance just yet. Having felt his stomach demanding nourishment of any sort, Warwick had departed from his den for the day to the bustling surface not to yet find a victim _per se_ , but to discover a good meal. Where he had snuck off to first, a great distance away from his home, was a butcher's shop sitting on the southern side of the densely-packed Bridgewaltz market. The meats on sale, made from freshly-slaughtered animals, were of all manner of size, shape, type and health. Some, as its vendor claimed with what appeared to be inflated pride, were even vat-grown.

Whatever the hell _that_ meant...

Warwick always remembered him as the type who tossed out whatever meat that had gone, in his eyes, too bad to sell. Where he abandoned them were the mold-coated metal dumpsters behind his shop, located in a small alleyway few ever visited from the incredibly foul, rotting stench it radiated. The chimera was unperturbed by it, and so turned the opportunity to his advantage. Upon reaching the alley containing the dumpsters after a short trek, he spotted a sight he did not expect to witness. Amidst the horrid fetor and the clouds of flies buzzing about in it, two smaller, canid shapes were there in the back, beside the trash, fighting over a great and uncovered chunk of meat he himself had come to gorge on.

Upon a quick inspection, Warwick realized that the two creatures were dogs. One was a gray, thin-furred hound, nothing more than skin and bone, and the other was a much smaller mongrel of a decidedly more brawny and reddish-colored build. They pulled on each end of the titanic slab, neither ever yielding in their tug of war for even a moment. Growling and barking over it from behind their misshapen teeth with desperation only hunger could provide, it seemed like there would be no winner. Their conflict came to an end, though, as they both stopped immediately when a new scent entered their dry noses. With a quick turn of their mangy, flea-bitten heads, they spotted the great and fearsome shape of Warwick stepping toward them.

One simple baring his teeth was all he needed to earn their submission. Their tails tucked between their legs, the two mutts walked to the corners of the alley with hushed whines, not even making a single attempt to defend the sustaining food they were once fighting so frantically for. His lips lowering back over his fangs, Warwick approached the slab of meat, stretched his long, sinewy and thick arms out to grab it, and brought it close to him. As he looked over its torn, but intact surface, the dogs watched him with envious glowers. Their tongues lolled out of their mouths as they panted in the putrid heat surrounding them, thick droplets of hungering drool dripping onto the slime-coated concrete floor they stood upon. Warwick would have eaten the whole thing himself right there as they could only watch him, but the chimera, as much as he tried to deny the notion himself, was not without pity.

With a swift motion of his claws over the slab, he tore off two sizable lumps of the stuff. Holding them carefully and flicking his wrist twice their way, he tossed each hunk to the strays that watched him, replacing their forlorn visages with ones of surprise. At first distrusting of this gesture, the short-haired hound began to crawl cautiously toward his chunk of delectable food, followed by the other mongrel to his. Finally deciding it was well and truly safe, and the enticing lure of the free meat calling to them like a siren's song, the dogs fully went after their pieces and wasted no time in tearing into them, filling their empty mouths and malnourished stomachs on it. As the sounds of the pair digging and ripping into the stiff meat went out, Warwick focused on his own portion.

He eyed its dull red complexion for a short while, tracing a claw over its cut surface. It was as the minute ended that he opened his jaws and took a bite from it. As he tore off his first chunk of the meat and slowly chewed it, he let his mind go back to that wondrous place. To Ionia. To Soraka and her divine smile. Every time he imagined it his heart would pound within his chest with immense force, beating with the most intense fury, like the effects of engaging in a spectacular hunt against the most deserving of vermin to inhabit this world. Every day he would go back to that wonderful spot in his imagination. Every day he would see it, even now, as he ground up the meat in his teeth and swallowed it.

A little over a month had passed since that day. As though someone had placed a meddlesome hex on his perception of time, every week that followed his return to Zaun felt like a year to Warwick. In fact, as well as he could begrudgingly believe, every passing day made him miss the memory of being in that place more. He _wanted_ to go there once again, but so long as criminals roamed these streets or else pulled their miserable strings from the sidelines, he knew he could never return; not unless another fled to the island nation in a vain attempt to evade him. Was it all because it was an actual good memory he gained from there? A memory devoid of pain, hatred and bloodshed? Perhaps so, but he never bothered to answer those questions. They were just too infinitely complex for him to trouble himself over.

After a short time, Warwick had gnawed his meat down to its bone. Licking his lips and wiping a hairy forearm over his lupine snout, he departed the alley, leaving the strays to finish their meals in peace. Stalking around unseen, he wandered over to the more populated parts of the Bridgewaltz. Usually saving his hunts for times past nightfall, but feeling up to it at the current moment, he decided today was a good time to look around for the most horrid of scum possibly drifting out in the open of the daytime they felt oh-so safe in from his wrath like the fearful stragglers they were.

He crawled atop a tall cathedral that had long since been converted into a small-time processing plant, where he had a nice view of most of the market before him. So long as he didn't fully expose his body and start making an attention-grabbing ruckus, no one would see him. But he would see _them_. Laying down upon its smooth tile surface, he waited patiently with just his face peering over the rooftop's edge, hoping to see or hear a criminal of any ranking who he could ambush. As his eyes roved around for such a sight, he observed all that went on below.

Visitors of the neighboring, rival city of Piltover wandered the markets alongside the native Zaunites and looked over all the goods and arts on sale and display, sticking out like sore thumbs amongst the crowd with their rich and classy attire. The Evolved, seeking new members of their growing flock, preached their words about the Glorious Evolution and all the joys of bargaining their humanity and aging flesh for longevity and purpose only complete technological augmentation could provide. The Lost Children of Zaun made an appearance as well, dashing through the crowded streets with hoots and hollers, annoying punks and merchants alike, and banging sticks and pipes against whatever would resound with a sharp sound; a grand showcase of their youthful energy.

Hours passed. Morning evolved into noon, and things remained relatively still. He was nearly about to give up hope that he would discover someone worth killing, when his large ears perked up, hearing a commotion. Now, the markets of Zaun were ripe with commotion, but what he heard now was something else. An angry curse, swiftly followed by a pained shout given from another voice. Discreetly descending from his perch, Warwick hopped from building to building in its direction until he located the source of the noise. Growing closer to his current rest's edge, the first thing he saw was a tall, lean man, standing over and apparently tormenting a shorter, fatter individual in wine merchant's clothing from just outside of what he could see was his shop. The latter individual was currently trying to pull himself up from the filthy ground with a whimper while the former continued to shout rude and threatening remarks his way, pulling out some sort of small, chem-powered firearm, jabbing it close to him once or twice as he yelled for him to get up faster, and then pocketing it back into its holster. He was a fellow in a hood with a grimy black beard, dressed in a filthy brown longcoat covered in a great many stitches, patches and stains. He was screeching at the merchant over a bottle of Graggy Ice-brand brew that had 'nearly poisoned him' after he bought it, or something of that nature.

It took Warwick a few good minutes of watching and listening in to the scuffle, but soon he was able to piece together just who this ragged character was with a sense of glee, recognizing his tanned face from numerous wanted posters plastered over every nook and cranny of the city. The charges he was wanted for, as far as Warwick knew or cared to memorize, were something to do with several murders and a robbery-or-two. Just from where he stood Warwick could detect the foul odor that clung specifically to him. He smelt of beer, chems, and aged blood. He carried the smell of a killer. He carried the stench of those deserving of his claws.

Before he could so much as form a thought to halt himself, Warwick prepared to leap. A howl sounded from his opened maw as it pointed to the sky, its pitch long and deep. Many of the people on the streets, at first collectively silent as they listened to the sudden sound, heard the noise slowly grow faint. The first scream of realization sounded when it became apparent at just what sort of feared creature made it, and more soon joined in on it like a choir. As the dark shape of Warwick flew through the air and landed on the ground with a resounding crunch of the brick beneath his weight, bodies scattered from view, each participant of the stampede scrambling over one another in their effort to get away from the fabled monster. Among the panicked throng was the man, who abandoned the wine merchant and his quarrel with him in favor of preserving his own worthless life.

Warwick would not allow him to escape so easily. Swinging his arm, he smashed aside a wooden stand laying in his way into splinters in his haste to reach his quarry. Lunging up multiple times and landing a varying distance in front of where his prey ran off to, he cut him off on several spots, separating him in particular from anyone until he was alone. Knowing he could not outrun the creature, the man was turning around in his stride to try and take a shot at his monstrous pursuer with his unholstered weapon, when he slipped on a large puddle of collected rainwater he had just traipsed over, losing his gun to its murky haze when he fell into it. Shouting a stream of curses as he fumbled around for it, Warwick took a small pounce his way and was upon him.

The man failed to grab at his only defense from his foe before Warwick sent his normal, left claw at him, grabbing him tightly by the shoulder and lifting him up into the air by it. He stared into his prey's gasping, soggy face of horror with a snarling grin of amusement. The kill was so _easy_. He could practically taste the gore that was about to fall and drip over his fangs as soon as he tore out his throat. Warwick's sheer lust for blood activated the alchemical devices he was forever bound to, transforming the green chemicals flowing in the chambers on his back into a sinister orange; primed and ready to agonizingly deliver their burning contents directly into his veins and trigger him into a mindless, bestial frenzy. And yet, as his mighty jaws opened to their widest, a thought came to him. And came to him with such force that it knocked out the murderous idea he had just formed.

In that one, fateful moment, his mind had once again, somehow, gone to the island nation sitting so far away from the polluted and addled cesspool that was Zaun. The image of Ionia and its beautiful, untouched landscape. Of the peaceful grove he healed in. Of... Soraka. He returned to the present after being consumed by these images for maybe a second, but he spent enough time in its presence that from it, an idea struck him like a bolt of lightning. The chemicals on his back's chambers returned to their green tint as clarity, however queer the sensation of it seemed, returned to him. Transforming his thoughtful visage into a glare aimed at the man in his grasp as the last of the people who happened to still be in the area abandoned the streets, he spoke.

"Go... to Ionia."

Whimpering like a child, complete with a stream of tears falling profusely from his bloodshot eyes and into his beard, the cowering man only registered the guttural words after he realized he had yet to violently die as he anticipated. "Wh-wh-wha-?" he squeaked, unable to properly form the complete word in the sheer terror he was experiencing.

" _Go to Ionia,_ " Warwick growled directly into his ear a second time, his volume lowering and grip around his shoulder squeezing harder to a painful degree, though with just enough care in his grip to keep a claw from piercing the flesh that laid beneath his clothing. To draw even a meager ounce of blood would be more than enough to drive him into a rampant frenzy that would surely rend his freshly-made plan into as many ribbons as this criminal would have become. "Go to Ionia, _now_. Go to the docks by the bay. Catch the first ship leaving for there this second, or I'll tear you to _shreds_. Right _here_."

"D-d-docks? I- _Ionia?_ " mewled back the man under the pressure of the chimera's grasp, clearly overwhelmed by not only his fear, but his rapidly-changing scenario as well. He eventually ceased his pitiful, weak struggling in Warwick's powerful paw, wanting more than anything to escape this awful fate, even if it meant listening to the creature he had thought less than intelligent until just now.

" _Yessss..._ " Warwick hissed with a wide grin, hot, rancid spittle flinging from his maw and onto his would-be victim's face. Lifting the man just a little higher above him and growling, he tossed him back to the ground with immense force, though he made sure to put enough care in the action so that it wouldn't break any of his bones. The breath left the man's lungs, but his mind raced. Crying out with a wheezing gasp as he regained all control of himself, he looked up at the towering shape of the Howler of Zaun with a bleak, shocked look.

"Well?" Warwick raised his mechanically-imbued arm in a threatening motion, striking his metal claws into the ground directly in front of his quarry and shedding sparks from them as an act of incentive to get on with it. "Go! _Go!_ " His final roar was near-deafening in pitch. The man didn't need to be told another time.

Scrambling to his legs in a most clumsy fashion, he fled down the street with a shriek, pushing aside whatever or whoever was in his way or else tripping over it. As he ran for his life through the entirety of Zaun to its bay, where the ferrying ships were all docked, Warwick stealthily followed behind him at a fast rate. It was a little while before he managed to reach them, but as he constantly turned his view behind himself in a paranoid manner, he did nonetheless. Warwick watched with glee as he saw him approach and babble to the ticket vendor, practically throwing his money at him from his pockets after demanding to be let on the first ship leaving for Ionia. Not understanding his cause for alarm, the vendor accepted the gold and presented a ticket to him, upon which the man snatched it away and got on the appropriate vessel.

A half-hour after he boarded, the ship began to set sail with the loudest of bellows from its great steam engines. Seeing his chance, Warwick leapt, unseen, into the sea and began to furiously paddle his way toward the ship. Reaching the departing vessel in a matter of seconds, he sent out and set his claws upon its stern, piercing its thick hull with minimum effort. Climbing up just enough to not drench himself in the salty surf below, he got a firm grip on the side and clung there like a tick on the hide of an unwitting deer.

He had given himself a reason to go to Ionia once again. A perfectly _valid_ reason. All he had to do now was wait...


	4. Chapter 4: A Serendipitous Visitation

It took a while to reach land, longer than Warwicked hoped. Through the whole ride he remained clinging to the metal hull of the ferry, never allowing his hardened grasp to lessen for even a second. Tough as it was to hold on, nearly without movement for such a lengthy period of time, this method of getting himself to Ionia's glimmering shores was much more preferable than swimming across the choppy and unforgiving stretch of water that separated the land two landmasses.

The ship had clearly entered its final stretch, and was making its steady way toward the mainland's docks less than a mile off, as it could be seen through the light morning mist that had settled over the sea. Holding on for just a minute longer, Warwick's awaited chance to depart soon came. As he leapt off, knowing that he would not be spotted by either the passengers on the ship or the on the distant shore, Warwick could see the noticeable claw markings he had left behind on the ship's stern. A scar on the mighty vessel that was going to remain there for some time to be sure.

But that was their problem now. The chimera fell into the briny surf with a loud splash, submerging below the great fog-concealed waves and out of sight for a moment before his soggy head poked up from the surface. With great, powerful strokes in every motion of his limbs, he quickly paddled his way toward land, to a particularly rocky spot on the shoreline he could see was apparently devoid of any wary life. He made his way there by the time the ship docked and its passengers departed. He waited for a small while, if only to give the scum he sent here a running start for cooperating in such a kindly manner, and then began his hunt. And it was only a matter of hours before he located the filthy man.

Within an extremely short timespan he found his newest prey walking shakily on a lonely, rural road with a rightfully paranoid gleam in his eye, and with an enraged howl, Warwick swiftly pounced upon him. The criminal had but a second to cry out before Warwick took his life, and he did so in quite the messy manner.

After getting over his bout of bloodlust-caused madness following the end of the gruesome kill, Warwick cleaned himself of the crimson ichor that stained his claws and muzzle, choosing to better rid himself of it in a nearby stream. When the last of the blood and remaining ocean salt from his swim had been swept from his form, he left the stream and shook himself dry. Stretching his muscles and joints our before dropping on all four of his legs, he began to sprint as fast as he could along the countryside, running far and wide, remembering his way to the grove and hoping to see the individual who dwelt within it.

After some time of travel, he came across the border of what he knew for certain was the place. He entered the new portion of woodland, and with his first step it was like walking into a whole other forest. The sound of wondrous and exotic birdsong was abundant, complimenting the feel of imperishable tranquility that sat here. He wandered further in, further enough until he felt it was right to begin vocalizing the name of who he searched for.

"Soraka?" He called out into the wind, hoping to attract the attention of the character who resided within it. The voice that came limping out of his throat, however, was a light, somehow choked sound. Annoyed by its unexpectedly dry and quiet pitch, Warwick cleared his windpipe with a growl and he started to call again as he took a few steps forward, venturing deeper into the place. "Soraka, are you here?"

Still silence was all that replied. The birds chirping overhead paid him little heed, only stopping their twittering for but a second or two to look over the newest creature to intrude upon their territory before happily going back to their sickeningly sweet and awe-inspiring songs. The chimera ignored the stares of their beady, judging eyes and walked forward. He called out Soraka's name twice more, and as he was about to speak it a third time, something spoke back.

"Does one who wanders my grove speak my name?" it called out in a female voice that Warwick recognized right off. With a newfound sense of haste in his stride, Warwick searched the grove for the voice that responded to him. Thanks to his keen senses of hearing and fast pace, he quickly located the source of the sound. Stepping lightly from behind a tree, right off he saw a female shape standing there. She was robed in a lush, amber-colored dress and was now setting her staff, bearing a familiar-looking crescent moon symbol upon its tip, against the trunk of a tree upon seeing him as well.

Indeed it was Soraka, sporting the absolutely largest smile Warwick could have sworn he ever saw. Given the fact that the only grins the chimera ever witnessed, as far as his memory could properly serve him, were made by unknowing individuals he spied on from the dark shadows of Zaun's clouted streets, he couldn't say he saw very many of them as up close as this. Nor could he say he saw any actually _aimed_ at a beast like him. The idea of such a thing was impossible to imagine.

And yet, that was what this queer person - assuming she truly was one - was doing right now. And it looked nothing short of genuine. Truly, his attention was far too stolen in making out Soraka's bewitching shape that he failed to realize she was dashing up to him like a zephyr of wind until it was far too late. Her thin arms outstretched, she wrapped her slender limbs around most of his unclothed midsection, enveloping him in a warm hug. Letting out a fearful yelp, Warwick staggered back at this utterly unexpected assault as though he had just been speared through the chest by a bolt from a ballista.

Keeping her hold around him strong, Soraka breathed a contented sigh. "You know not how truly _happy_ I feel now, with your return!" she smiled to him, her golden eyes staring right up at his startled face. "I knew you would come back to visit me. You said you were uninterested in such a prospect, but I just _knew_ those words were hollow!"

Warwick was still frozen in his terror and confusion, his own forelimbs expanded wide and far above Soraka, but completely unwilling to make any sort of attempt to separate himself from the being currently hugging him. Apparently realizing his immense discomfort, Soraka finally ended her embrace and stepped back, allowing him to lower his guard and regain some of his prior composure.

"Apologies if I frightened you, I could not help myself," she chuckled warmly, the sound of it wiping away the last of the chimera's shock from her action. Stepping back several paced through the short grass of the grove, she picked up her staff where she had placed it previously and spun around to face him once again. All Warwick could do was blankly look at her, still eternally perplexed by her sheer euphoria to again witness a monstrosity like himself.

"Well?" she inquired next, lowering a brow and placing her free hand upon her curvaceous hip in a waiting posture. "I gave you my greeting, and you proved to me once before that you are a most intelligent creature. Will you not give me yours?"

As tempted as Warwick was to just run off then and there with all the that had just happened, the wish for his taxing journey to pay off was far stronger than his fears, and so he spoke. "It's... good to see you again," was his response to her question, given in a way that sounded only nervous and ill-prepared. He turned his lupine snout away and set his eyes upon the trees in that direction, his expression now radiating a sense of awkwardness. As a gentle breeze rattled the green leaves of the trees above, Soraka lightly laughed again, raising her hand from her side to her mouth to muffle it a bit.

Warwick switched his focus back onto her again, his expression twisting angrily. "What's so funny?" he demanded to know, his voice a harsh rasp.

"Nothing, nothing," she responded, her giggling starting to fade like slowly dying embers, keeping her mirthful appearance intact. "I merely realized _why_ you returned here. You miss the feeling you got from when I tended to your wounded body after I found you in that injured state. From when we first became antiquated with one another. What you miss more than anything is my touch. You _did_ come to receive such a treatment from me, did you not?"

Warwick ground his fangs together in his mouth, anxiety filling him from the little fact that she was right. She had read his mind like a book. "I might have..."

"Then why do we still stand here?" Soraka began to shift her position around in a most flirtatious and free manner, eagerness entering the movement. "Come deeper into my grove with me. There is a _perfect_ spot where I can soothe your needs. It is a place where the sun shines most pleasantly and the air seems even lighter than where we dwell now..."

Warwick was only just making sense of her words before Soraka suddenly took off, vanishing behind the tree closest to her and out of sight. Recovering only as the last shred of her flowing dress and long hair disappeared with the body they belonged to, and wishing not to lose her, Warwick dropped on all fours and began pursuing her through the forester area the moment his mind caught up with the present. Catching only the faintest of glimpses of her as he ran behind her, each one showing only the strange character dashing behind a tree, bush or some other obstacle in his way, Warwick realized that she was much, much faster than he expected. Maybe even slightly faster than himself, as hard as it was to believe. Either way, the chase ended minutes after it began when Warwick made a final turn, coming across her resting shape a scant two meters off from it.

She was sitting on a smooth stone that emerged from the grassy earth, like a seat of rock that had been waiting there to cushion her on its fine solid surface. Catching his breath fast enough, Warwick looked to her face and saw it was . She raised a calm hand his way and curled it inward twice, beckoning him to approach her. Eyeing her with a visage of caution, he soon did so, moving right on up to her in but three steps. He then simply stood there, staring down at the eccentric, but enticing individual, plainly unsure on what to do next.

"I can't really tend to you like you desire if you're standing," she chuckled upon seeing his quandary. She patted a palm against her covered legs twice in an inviting gesture. "Lay down upon my lap. It will be fine, as it was last time. As I recollect, you enjoyed it immensely, yes?"

Warwick's large ears flicked irritably. After letting out a small bit of unintelligible grumbling, he set his knees upon the soft, neat grass below him. There was a nettlesome sense nibbling upon the back of his mind like a saw-toothed leech from the Plague Jungles of Valoran's far south, telling him that doing so at her behest was incredibly undignified. Overall it was drowned out by his desire to re-experience her loving hands caress his battered hide. Shifting himself around until his thigh was in the place of his knees, he set the side of his great head upon her lap with a sigh.

Everything he had done since forcing that criminal from Zaun and then chasing him here was for this sole purpose of this moment. This single, fragile moment. Were there anything Warwick to compare his situation to right now, he thought himself a hopeless addict seconds away from receiving his next fix. And by whatever gods that did exist in this cruel world, he was going to _get_ that fix. He was still keeping his mind on all this and what repercussions might be held in store when Soraka finally laid her hands upon him, caressing them softly over the top of his head, soon trailing them around the base of his ears. As it happened, everything that ever troubled Warwick was replaced by pure of an unfathomable degree no mortal creature could hope to fully comprehend.

That touch; that wonderful, _incredible_ touch. Starting almost as soon as she had first ran her delicate fingers across his crown, Warwick's entire guard was down and a long, pleased whine escaped him. His fangs chattered together when his strength abandoned him. His normally tense, stiffened and weary joints loosening at the heavenly feeling, they felt like they, too, were becoming weak. Like they were melting. Melting away into nothing but blissful little puddles, free of the daily torments that plagued his bestial, mutated self since the ghastly day he became what he was now.

His eyes fluttering as Soraka traced her hands over his innumerable scars, Warick felt tempted to close them and lose himself to sleep in the arms of this kindly, ethereal being. But with no short amount of will, he forced them to remain open. He forced them to remain open, to keep himself awake and aware for the sake of being able to gaze into the golden eyes staring back. Soraka looked at his canid face as it fought to remain conscious, and a curious brow on her face lowered, though her smile remained where it was. It was only a matter of seconds - or hours, as Warwick found himself losing track of time - before she spoke something.

"You look like you have a question," she voiced as lightly as the breeze that passed through the chimera's fur. She had started brushing her fingers and nails around his neck and throat by this time, getting at both the weak and hard-to-reach spots where Warwick could never hope to envelope in the absolutely heavenly sensation she was giving them now. He heard her well in spite of his partial daze, and searched his brain desperately for the right response until he found it.

"I... may."

"Then why do you not speak it? If it is something I know, I'll answer it."

Yes, Warwick had but a single question, however minuscule it was. He had gazed upon the forests of Ionia as he traveled through them on his way here. And yet, none of them could compare to the untarnished beauty of this peculiar grove that he now rested in, just from the point of view his prone form had now. The point of view that left this strange, pallid maiden appearing like an angel in the midst of the flaxen sunlight that showed through the tops of the trees. "What... what is this place?" he asked Soraka, wishing to know why it was so, and just barely vocalizing his query after being caught again in her alluring visage.

"Oh? Well, this place is known throughout Ionia as the Astral Grove. It is my home, and a sanctuary for all those in need," stated she. Her face lifted from Warwick's as she went on, peering upward at the clear azure sky. "And at that, it is host to many beautiful sights. If one were to stay here past nightfall and peer upward at the darkened sky, they would be rewarded with the most spectacular view of the infinite cosmos imaginable; a view unrivaled by perhaps anywhere else on this world. The stars shine brightest here, in this grove, for they once graced this place with their touch."

Caressing her thin fingers over some of the more wretched scars lining Warwick's long, lupine muzzle in a most gentle motion, provoking another pleasured whining sound from him, a mirth-filled sigh escaped Soraka as she took her eyes from the blue heavens and focused them back on her guest's dim and faintly-aware expression. "I've lived here for longer than I could ever remotely hope to remember, and still I look up at the sky most nights with untempered awe at what can be seen."

Warwick was still plenty sensible enough to properly make out what Soraka said, and a single, incredulous puff fled his mouth, disbelieving the legend she described. "It is a cute story I'll admit, but I have a hunch that there might be... more to it," came his grunt. He went quiet for few seconds, thinking of the other question he wished to have answered. "If I am allowed to ask of this as well; what... even _are_ you? You look human, but I have never seen one who resembles, or much less acts as you do. Even where I lay now, I sense _something_ in you that I have never once experienced before."

Soraka breathed a silent laugh at this. "I am a Starchild," spoke she, always excited at the impossibly rare opportunity for herself to explain her origins to another who would listen. "Human, I am not. I was birthed from the stars themselves, long before humanity came into being. It was from the glittering nocturnal heavens from whence I came. It is from them that I possess all my power."

She exhaled a deep breath, as though lost in a thought. "And it is from them alone that I use that power to mend that which has been broken."

"It seems odd that you would be... _alone_ here, given what I've seen of your... 'Astral Grove'. Are there more of your kind? Assuming what you speak is true, anyhow."

Soraka blinked her eyes twice at that. After staring off to and pondering over how to respond for a slow second, she did so. "Once, there were others. _Once_ , there were others. We were born here when the world was formed, as one. Our purpose was to observe what went on in the world around us, and to heal and care for those who sought us out. We were meant to aid the life that formed around the Astral Grove, but never directly partake in their affairs."

A smile, sad as it was, came over her lips. Her golden eyes stared at the similarly-colored head of her staff laying beside her before shifting to the grassy ground below it. "Over time, some of us grew restless with our duties. Some of my siblings disobeyed the stars' grand design with their actions, and were thusly stripped of their inheritance and rendered mortal. Time has gone on, as it always does, and one-by-one their faces have... _faded_ from my memory. Only I remain now, to fulfill the will bestowed upon me." She turned to Warwick, her face rather frank. "Only _I_ remain within the grove. And still I watch over it. Still I care for those who will come. And I would not have it any other way."

"What about the ones who did... _that?_ What happened to them?" Curiosity had come into Warwick's tone, and it was all too clear that he wanted it sated as much as her loving touch upon his disfigured, mechanically and alchemically-infused hide.

"I bear hope that some yet live, in other parts of the world," Soraka said. "I hope that they are living what sort of lives they desire. And that hope is all I need."

Soraka went silent, setting most of her attention back on Warwick's body alone, seeking to continue to relieve it of its stress. He was about to suspect that she had done so because of his personal questions, when her head shot upward, as though detecting something the chimera could not.

"Do you hear that?" she asked, her tone serious. Warwick did not, and so he began to collect himself.

Indeed, not a moment into focusing on anything but Soraka, his valuable hearing organs picked up something most peculiar. The second he caught it, he lifted himself from her lap, stood up on his own two feet and looked back at her, his visage grave but unsure. "Yes, I do." What they both seemed to hear, however distant as it was, was the sound of someone in distress; a sobbing, desperate voice crying out for help. By the time Warwick had regained full control of his once-relaxed self, Soraka had already left her seat and dashed away in a bolt.

As soon as he was able, Warwick immediately followed her, racing through the woodland to catch up to where she was going off to. After sprinting in the Starchild's trail for a short time he made his way through a final, thick line of thin, green bamboo stalks and saw Soraka once more. She had laid her staff against a tree beside her, and was approaching a shape who stood alone not a short few feet from her. The shape of a person, and indubitably the one individual responsible for the cries of help.

She was a women, young in appearance, and possessing long, black hair that fell from her head. She was panting, possessed lightly shaded bags under her eyes and overall looked incredibly weary, evidently from travel. She was short in height and dressed in thick, colorful clothing, many symbols resembling long-bodied serpents sewn into them. In her hands, held close to her chest, was a small bundle. Warwick didn't have to think twice to realize that it was most likely a small, young infant. As he studied her and what she carried, the woman caught sight of him as well. When her face began to visibly widen in shock and terror, Soraka came between them, her own expression one of peace.

"Worry not about him," she informed the mother, her soft words full of comfort that served well to mitigate the woman's immediate terror. "He is a friend of mine." She stepped closer to the frightened maiden, seeking her blatant conundrum more than anything else. "Who is that who rests in your arms? I sense something most dire about him."

"H-h-h-he is m-my son," she started, shifting her focus from the bestial creature to the infant she held. "I came here... I-I came here in the hopes to save his life. He's been... deathly i-ill for nearly a month. There is no cure for what he has, and my elders have told me that he might... die if I don't find something that will. I have nowhere else to go. Are... are you the Starchild who resides here? The one whose gits lie in healing?"

"I am," answered Soraka. "And everything you heard of me is true."

"If that is so, than can you... c-can you save my boy?" the woman asked again. "My family and neighbors told me to come here. They mentioned you, and what you were capable of. For m-my whole life I thought you were just a myth, but they directed me to come to this place. They said you are the only one who could save him. Can... you?"

"Allow me to find that out, my honored guest. May I see him?"

The woman kept her view glued to her precious offspring, knowing good and well what her only choice was. Giving her poor tot a final kiss to his burning forehead, she slowly handed her son over to Soraka on trembling hands. Soraka accepted him into her own, and as soon as she had him, brought the ailing little one close to her own chest in a compassionate, motherly motion and walked back several paces to gain space. Sensing the disturbance of the shifting hands, the child awoke from whatever dreamless sleep it was in and began to limply move his tiny hands about and cry out, his pitch weak and riddled with ragged breaths and small coughs. The Starchild was unperturbed by the baby's miserable puling, and lifted one hand to the fore of his minuscule, bundled body.

Closing her eyes, Soraka thought on how to best deliver her inner power to the fragile newborn, setting all of her focus onto him. Within a matter of seconds her hand began to glow green, and that glow only expanded until it became nearly blinding. Shielding his eyes with one of his arms, Warwick could feel the powerful, potent energies radiating from Soraka's hand just from where he stood. They were soft, warm, and full of... vibrant life. It was an unimaginably pleasant, but numbing sensation that made his knees feel pangs of weakness. Still the child continued to cry out, but as Warwick could discern, the whinging sound it made began to slowly, slowly die down. Her eyes opening, the glow of Soraka's palm faded away, and things soon went silent for an entire minute. With little warning to herald its coming, a soft giggling began to come from the little one, filling the breakable air with its innocent mirth.

Smiling back with it, her fine, white teeth showing, Soraka drifted over to his mother over the grass separating them. With only care in her graceful movements, she gently handed him back into her waiting arms. "He is well, now," she informed the blatantly rapturous woman. "He was indeed infested with a most sinister disease, but I have cured it. He is as healthy as can be, and if he is cared for well, he will grow only stronger."

The mother could only make a mixture of sobbing sounds as she made an attempt to say something in thanks to her child's savior, eventually doing so after collecting herself just enough. "O-oh... oh, bless you, Starchild!" she exclaimed, holding her boy as close to her chest as she could without harming him, tears streaming in thick beads from her eyes as she continued to spout her endless thanks. "Bless you, _bless_ you! You've saved his life! Oh, bless you!"

Weeping profusely with only the purest joy, she thanked Soraka nearly a dozen more times as the rejuvenated, happy child in her grasp seemed to try to make sense of what was happening with its infant mind. For a few minutes, the quietly observing Warwick thought she was going to erode the term 'bless you' dry into meaninglessness, and it made him twitch one of his big, pointed ears in minor annoyance. Well enough for him, she eventually stopped the tiresome praising and instead asked Soraka if there was anything at all she could do or give to repay the Starchild's kind miracle; to which Soraka politely declined, saying there was nothing she wanted that the mother could hope to give.

They talked for a short time, but the conversation did come to its conclusion, both speakers knowing of the lengthy journey the mother would have to take to get back to her home village. Speaking her goodbyes after a few moments more of kissing her boy and caressing the few small hairs growing from his soft head, the mother and her child departed from the grove, leaving Warwick and Soraka alone again at last. It was when the last of the woman's shape vanished into the treeline when the Starchild turned around and began walking back in the chimera's direction. Collecting her staff as she passed Warwick, Soraka gave him a wide and simple (or was it satisfied?) grin, leaving her eyes only half open to look at him with. There was something smug about her mien, probably having to do with the doubt Warwick expressed over her supernatural origins, but he tried his best to ignore it. The quiet between them ended when he chose to speak up.

"That was... a kind thing you did for her." The chimera's remark was low in pitch, but true. "The way you healed her child. The manner by which you... managed to place a smile upon its face. And the mother's as well."

Soraka hummed happily. "If there is anything worth noting about me, it's that I _adore_ the young ones. You know, there was a time when a village full of youth rested close to my grove, but after many years and generations of attempting to live off of the lush but harsh wilds, they soon moved on to more easily-cultivatable and spacious areas that could accommodate them better. Not a trace remains of the place now," she began to recall, her tone ripe with remembered fondness. She inhaled a deep breath, thinking to the moment she described next. "I used to love to play with the children who came from there to see me in my grove. I would spend many hours of each day teaching them all I knew of life and its endless supply of secrets. I have a great deal less opportunities to have social relations with others in the present, but I manage. I get many visitors some days, though most of them come to me seeking remedies more than company. I hardly see the same face twice."

"I can see why you seemed so happy to have me around." Warwick said this with an understanding nod. "In _some_ ways, anyway..."

"Oh, I was _ecstatic_ to see you again, my friend." She beamed at him, unable to help herself. "In all honesty, you are someone I would _love_ to get to know further. I swear, if it instead was true, when you grumbled about wanting to ignore my invitation to return here last we saw each other, I still wouldn't have-"

"Warwick."

Halting in her step, as did Warwick, Soraka immediately paused at his interruption. Her head tilted to the left at his abrupt word, and a brow lifted on her fair face. "What did you say?"

"Warwick," repeated Warwick. He postured himself a little straighter, keeping his view forward still and tone as firm and practical as he could muster. What came out seemed to be only half of what he wanted. "That's, erm... that's my... name."

A small moment of silence came across the two, and Warwick knew that Soraka was processing this new bit of information on himself. Her facial features curling into a most pensive countenance, she turned forward with him, biting her lip as she put on that characteristic smile of hers and a curious gleam sparkled in her eyes. "Warwick? Warwick. Hmm... _Warwick._ " As she resumed her walk and her bestial friend began to follow beside her, Soraka placed a finger upon her lips, her querying visage shifting into a positively delighted one as she went on repeating his name. It was almost like she was savoring this tender morsel of knowledge. "Warwick, Warwick, Warwick..."

It quickly got on the Chimera's nerves, and the fur lining his neck began to bristle with his indignation, already starting to regret mentioning it. "Well, don't wear it out," he muttered, his fingers curling inward in frustration, their knuckles hardening slightly. "It's just a name. And it's all I have."

"Don't mind me, I just wanted to familiarize myself with it," she responded. "But what's _really_ gotten my mind enlivened is why you decided to tell me."

"Well... you gave me yours," He cleared his throat by emitting what could only be described as a choked semi-coughing sound into his paw. "I thought it was only right to give you mine. To... return the favor, so to speak."

"You certainly returned it a little late, wouldn't you agree?" she teased him, leaning closer his way to playfully bump her shoulder against his arm, her overall tone and expression good-natured. "But I thank you for doing it anyway, 'Warwick'."

Warwick grumbled again, but nodded in agreement as he did so.


	5. Chapter 5: Visions From a Forgotten Life

_Warwick's eyes o_ _pened to a void of swirling blackness. To an endless torrent of nothing. Without a second to gain any sort of grip as to what was happening he was swept up and sent drifting through it aimlessly; clumsily tumbling, more like. There was nothing he could grab a hold of to stabilize himself, and there was nothing that would catch him. This was a place where gravity mattered not, and cared as such. His mind felt both ill and as he fell and flew through the barren void, unknowing and dreading what would become of him._

 _Everything felt terribly off, as all he experienced burned at each and every one of his senses like salt to his eyes. For that, Warwick instantly despised being here - Wherever 'here' was. He flew around and about further, not stopping, merely enduring. Onward he hurtled, helpless to halt himself. Helpless to figure out what new hell he had entered or what terrible sin he had committed that earned him this fate. Helpless to do anything at all._

 _And then he came across a shape._

 _His own form seemed to abruptly stop at last the moment this shape came into his sights out of nowhere. It was right there in front of him, just a few feet away. Immediately craving to know what or who it was, t_ _he shape seemed to oblige him when it grew closer. Its details came to light soon enough._

 _It was a humanoid figure. A woman's figure. A_ familiar _figure. She was a young, or at least short woman bearing dark skin, a thin and sickly frame, and possessed rich chocolate-brown hair that fell from her head in thick locks, just past her shoulders. Some other parts of her were just clear enough to make sense of, such as the muddy grey patchwork clothes she wore. But like a reflection cast from a pool of water that been disrupted by ripples from a thrown stone, Warwick could not fully make her other parts out. Her face was partially blurred; enveloped in a curtain of shadow, yet revealing enough to allow her green eyes to pierce through the veil._

 _Seeing the blurred vision provoked a queer sound. It started low and weak, then rose to a sharp cry. It screamed itself through the ethereal air like a crack of lightning from a vicious storm, or a banshee's screech that heralded one's imminent end. He heard it call out to him in an agonized voice like his own, yet at the same time not. It was a sound. A word. A... name. Not his, but someone else's. He realized in that second that is was_ this _person's name. And yet still he knew not what it was. Who_ she _was._

 _Like her, as she was now, it was only familiar to him - nothing more. For the life of him, he knew not what it was. He knew not at all or in the slightest what it was, and that fact burned like fiery brand searing itself into his flesh; another scar to be added onto the pile that was his twisted body. It stuck there at the fore of his senses, digging itself into his lost memory in a way that was only maddening - like an uncommon word he was trying to pronounce that only balanced itself at the tip of his tongue and never fully left his mouth._

 _The shape began to dematerialize, but still that wretched noise cried on. He wanted the being before him to stay, but at the same time leave. Like a knife that had pierced his chest and made its way to his beating heart with the intent to stop it, and yet left only deadly ecstasy in its insidious wake instead of agony. He drifted on for what seemed like hours, alone, and that was all he was able to do._

 _He needed to know what it was. Why was this vision haunting him as it did? Was it from his past, or merely a fictional figment of his mind? What was it?_

 _What_ was _it?_

What was it?!

* * *

Warwick's eyes flashed open, this time to reality, the immaterial void of his dreams collapsing in on itself and vanishing into nothing. In but the span of his eyelids lifting, it all replaced itself with the serene, brightly-lit surroundings of the Astral Grove. The place where only peace was welcome. Adjusting to the appropriate feelings dwelling within this landscape quickly, the echoes of the voice he heard in his head evolved into the buoyant tweeting of the many different birds that inhabited this tranquil sanctuary.

Unable to truly conceive his return here after what had just happened to him, Warwick blinked several times before concluding that this was indeed physical existence and not the chaotic realm of his mind.

As he regained full lucidity, he wanted to know now more than anything what the time of day had become. He moved his wide-eyed gaze skyward, searching for where the sun currently was. It was setting in the far distance, leaving a crimson sky in its wake with a texture resembling the blood he had become so accustomed to spilling. His breathing slowing, he turned his head upward from where he lay and found Soraka staring down at him, her supernatural eyes of gold reflecting the dimming sunlight as the leaves in the trees above her did. Her overall expression was of concern, evidently knowing of his dream, or at the very least sensing his current rush of anxiety.

Warwick remembered still how he came to be here in this position. After he witnessed the Starchild lend her aid to that mother and her child, Soraka and himself had returned to their spot from before. He allowed her to resume the pleasant activity that had originally convinced him to come back to this island nation once again, and she did so with glee. After a short while of experiencing the soothing touch only she could provide to his scarred flesh, Warwick fell to the lure and had lost himself to sleep at last. A long and restful slumber it surely was, but how it was filled with that one nightmare made it seem like it wasn't worth it.

Soraka spoke up after a few seconds of watching he guest look about with his panicked mien. "Are... you alright, Warwick?" she asked him after what felt like an eternity, her voice soft and filled with care for her friend.

Warwick looked to and stared at her for almost a minute before answering. "I'm fine," he soon grumbled, shaking his head as his grip on the image of that face and the name it belonged to started to slowly fade to the back of his mind, like a tower crumbling to dust. His ear twitched and his black nose sniffled, his view going back to the horizon. "What... what happened to me?"

"You were asleep," she said. "You were calm for a while, but a short time ago you became restless. You were muttering, talking, crying out for something. I think you were saying a name."

Spinning his head with startling speed back in her direction no sooner had he left it, Warwick's eyes, widened and glimmering with surprise most intense, darted to Soraka. "What name?" he asked, urgency to know in his tone. He sat up from her lap, his stare glued onto her and fanged mouth opened only slightly ajar when his first sentence ended. "What name did I say?"

The Starchild obliged him without a second thought. "I believe it was... 'Inna'."

"'Inna'?" Warwick echoed, his voice choked. Adrenaline filling his system no sooner had his ears picked up that one name, his pupils dilated with his lowered brow. The once-fading image stormed back to the fore of his mind, and stayed there. Odd feelings raced up and down his spine like a jolt of electricity. _Mixed_ feelings, both fearful and curious. "That was what I said?"

"Yes. Several times, in fact."

"Are you _sure?_ "

"I am."

With that, Warwick's view shifted to the grassy ground below him and he stewed on this revelation. Like what he witnessed in his dream, this name was incredibly familiar but utterly _alien_. Squeezing his eyes shut and growling most savagely, the chimera wanted only to make sense of his vision.

Arms lifting, he placed his claws to either side of his head in order to try and focus his thoughts. It worked to no avail. With the unbearable feeling failing to abandon him, frustration and anger began to take hold. He growled and dug his index claws into his temples in the vain hopes to alleviate his mental pains by adding something more physical to the brew. They pierced his flesh with relative ease, drawing two small, fresh streams of blood down the two sides of his lupine head. Soraka, thoroughly uncomfortable by what she was witnessing, placed a delicate hand upon one of his wrists.

"Warwick. Please, do not trouble yourself so greatly over this simple thought," she bid, her immense concern evident in both her touch and voice. "Let it go for now, and let yourself relax. As long as you have even a small grip on this memory it will come to you when it so chooses. I implore you, Warwick."

When several seconds passed by and nothing happened, it seemed Soraka's words had fallen on deaf ears. However, soon enough did her words affect the chimera. Warwick sluggishly lowered his claws from his head and allowed them to fall by his side. His breathing slowed and he blinked calmly twice. Casting her eyes briefly away from Warwick, if to look at and settle out her dress with her hands, Soraka collected herself and thought of what wise course of action should be taken now.

"How about we take this from the top. What sort of dream did you experience?" inquired she, returning her attention to her friend. "What was it you _first_ saw?"

With a voice in his head nagging him on giving away what was surely a personal matter of his, Warwick was at first hesitant to say the only thing he could properly remember. "A... woman." Hints of uncertainty were ripe in his low tone, as if he felt as though he could not trust his own memory. "I witnessed a woman I could not identify. And then... _nothing_."

"Do you know any other details to her being?"

Warwick obliged her. For the next few minutes he described the image as best as he could. When it was clear that he could describe her no more, his breath again quickened as his brain fought in vain to make sense of his vision and all the muddled details cast upon it. "I want to know who she is. I want to remember her. But I just... _cant!_ "

Warwick growled in frustration once more and his head drooped forlornly. Her lips rubbing together in a shared sense of vexation, Soraka calmly said, "Just keep these images as in focus as they are now, and give yourself time." She lifted a careful hand to his left temple, wiping away some of the thick, drying ichor that was seeping through his fur with her thumb. Using just a fraction of her power, she closed both of his minor, self-inflicted wounds simultaneously, halting their flow of lost blood for good. "If you just give yourself time and patience, it will come to you. I know it."

Warwick stewed on both her words and his own worries. As this occurred he again noticed, with more clarity, that the sun was nearing the completion of its descent over the western horizon. Only one, particular thought came to him then. "I've spent too much time here. I think I had better leave now."

Soraka heard him well, having fearfully expected to receive this notice of departure since he awoke. A sigh passing from her mouth betrayed her deep sadness at his choice, given the sights she wished to show him come nightfall, but she understood his decision. "Before you leave, may I ask something of you, my friend? It is about our visits."

While he still kept his mind enlivened with the foggy images of that strange woman who relentlessly and tantalizingly poked at his thirst for answers, Warwick felt some relief by this change of conversation. "Of course. What is it?"

"It's simply a request. Nothing major."

"And this simple request would be...?"

To his impatience, Soraka lightly tittered and bluntly stated, "There are times when you shouldn't come to visit me. They are not often, but they still occur."

Warwick was honestly caught off guard by her words. He raised one brow, the other falling, doing well to show his bafflement. "What... sort of times are those?"

"Only nights where the sky is clear and the silver rays of the fullest moon shine down upon this part of the world." Standing and using her staff to help herself off of her seat, Soraka kept her smile, her tone still whimsical, but unusually serious. "Those are the only times I _cannot_ receive you as a visitor, unless your situation is absolutely dire enough. The daytime on those dates are perfectly fine, but _not_ the nighttime."

"Why?" Warwick found himself wanting to know.

Inhaling the fresh, sweet air of her grove lightly, Soraka turned back his way and looked upward to the green leaves of a nearby tree, her grin still there on her face, but overall expression transparent to her true emotions. "I would rather not say."

Like a fool pouring gasoline upon a budding flame with the hopes of extinguishing it, her excuse only fueled the chimera's curiosity tenfold. "Is there something wrong with those days?"

"It is merely a private matter of mine." She waved her hand nonchalantly. Her head swiveled slowly back to him, her expression composed and cheerful. "A very sensitive subject. One that I have rarely shared with anyone, and would prefer to... keep to myself."

Even though he wished to probe further and perhaps uncover whatever this odd secret might have been, Warwick decided to stay in his current boundaries. His tail swishing behind himself twice in minor vexation, he grunted in understanding, lowering his head and closing his eyes. "Then very well; I will not come to you on those nights, Soraka."

"Thank you." Sincerity in her tone, Soraka sighed and approached her friend, the smile on her face now again as radiant as the setting sun. His eyes opening and peering her way again, Warwick looked at the Starchild and her euphoric expression coming ever so close to him. He looked at her undeniable beauty, unknowing as to how he could extend his conversation before it inevitably soured and turned more awkward than it surely was already. Fearing that outcome, he chose to end it instead.

"Goodbye for now." He turned away with a jerking motion, reluctantly ripping his view from her. "I may return, if I find another opportunity to do so. But then again, I might not."

Soraka hummed, "Well, in either case, I would love to have you over again. I honestly do. Farewell, Warwick. Until next we hopefully meet."

"'Hopefully'," he murmured back, heavy skepticism in his tone that Soraka did not believe for even a second. Falling on all fours, Warwick dug his heels into the grass-covered dirt below him and took off. He was soon gone, and with his departure Soraka was immediately embraced by an old acquaintance of hers she put up with so very often.

Solitude.

Solitude was a most lonesome thing. But with solitude came truest peace. With solitude came time to reflect. It was then when an idea entered her mind. It was a hope-filled idea aimed toward the future, and it made her beam with richest delight. Unable to find any reason not to halt herself, she chose to act on it.

Soraka wandered through her grove with her staff in hand, her stride almost a mirthful skip. The Starchild continued on in this way for a trivial length of time until she come across something large laying upon the ground, sitting harmlessly over the green grass.

It was a log of old, dead wood that had fallen some time ago. Wood from the gloamwood trees, to be specific. Artists treasured the material for more physical projects since it was well known for both its pliability and long-lasting durability against the likes of time and even exposure to the elements. Mostly was it used for sculpting or carving a wide variety of ceremonial items, and Soraka had, in fact, learned to do so as well. Some of her founded skill was learned from those who had passed by her domain from either trouble or wish to simply use the grove's beauty as a form of inspiration. The rest of it was from time and endless hours of practice and self-teaching.

After collecting a sizable portion of the wood in one of her hands, the Starchild got back up and moved on, humming most happily. Reaching her next destination, a grey, moss-covered boulder, she set aside her wood and staff on the side of a tree and knelt down in front of it. Lifting the large rock almost effortlessly, she gazed into the dark soil it once covered and saw the item she was after hidden within - a knife. The tool possessed a long, curled, silver blade, and etched along its wooden handle like slithering snakes were several minuscule blessings, written in an older Ionian dialect. Sighing in reverie, Soraka grabbed the knife, gripping it well in one of her hands as she pulled it from its spot.

It was a carving knife, one of the variety artists used to craft wood, no matter their size, into masterworks; the variety bearing a blade made of ancient metals that scarcely dulled. This particular one was a gift from one of the artists who visited her so very long ago. He was a fellow of robust workmanship who had come to her home in the hopes of creating a sculpture in the fabled Starchild's likeness. Soraka was more than happy to oblige him, and posed as still as stone for a great many hours just for his project. He offered the item to her in appreciation of her assistance after he had completed his grand work, and while Soraka stated that she needed no such thing, he insisted she take it with no intent on hearing her refuse.

With the knife in one hand and the recollected block of aged and lifeless wood tucked under her shoulder, Soraka leisurely sauntered through her grove, all as her staff left its spot and floated after her. It was almost as though an obedient current of wind had swept it up as easily as a bird's feather.

Soon did Soraka come across another great tree she liked to visit, with an immensely thick trunk extending many hundreds of feet above the ground. Upon its branches were leaves of a reflective, ashen black. With only a cheerful expression on her face, which was shown just as plainly in her movements, Soraka, followed swiftly by her staff, moved up to the ancient plant's base and sat down between two of its mighty roots that extended into the soil.

Placing the piece of wood on the grass before her, Soraka eyed it for a long while, thinking of exactly the kind of work she wanted to make it into. With care, she brought the knife's silver blade to the wood's hide and began her task with steady vigor. She whittled and carved it away piece by piece, slowly, slowly crafting the object into another shape entirely...

* * *

Night was upon Zaun when Warwick reached its unforgettable shores at last, having swam the whole way there. He swam and then waded through the last few hundred meters of the murky water until he stood upon dry land, shaking himself and his shaggy fur dry when he was done.

He felt only somewhat weary from the trip, and there was little doubt in his mind that it had to do with his resting in that Astral Grove. Upon the lap of that strange, beautiful being - that _Starchild_ \- were his greatest torments rendered numb by something reminiscent of pleasure and... something else. By her mystical touch and sweet voice, his most agonizing of chemically-infused muscles and mechanical augmentations felt that less excruciating. Granted, it wasn't much, but the fact that it reduced the constant pain he had to endure by any measure was miraculous in and of itself.

With stealth in his movements, Warwick trekked through the corrupt city of Zaun. While his senses kept track of all that went on around him and how to elude and maneuver about the bustling metropolis of unchecked ingenuity and rampant capitalism, he kept his mind fixed on another image for the journey - that dream he had. He still remembered what Soraka had told him, about keeping his memory fresh. With any shred of hope or luck, perhaps it would come to him. Perhaps he could uncover the secret behind this mysterious 'Inna' and who she was...

As he reached and then walked through the grime-coated pipeline leading to his lair, all he could think of the woman as he saw her in his dream. That familiar image that had presented itself to him in an almost taunting manner. It was not a memory of pain but of pure perturbation; it was a memory of something that had taken place sometime before he became the fiend he was now, but it was not an event he recalled. That much he did know. It was just about-

Warwick's thoughts were all equally smothered in an instant as he suddenly experienced a strange smell. The odor hit his nose with the rude abruptness of a slap to the face, and it did so greatly enough that the chimera halted in his stride.

This one was new. Different from the usual stink he picked up whenever he entered his home. While it possessed a certain horridness to it like any other scent that would find itself here, it was less like the usual dull and dank smell that clung to these walls and more like the smell of food and drink that had rotted or turned, mixed with... _something else._ Not anything he would drag down here, that was certain.

Instantly sensing something was surely amiss, Warwick grew caution in his movements forward and began prowling the rest of the way at a stalking pace. After slinking forth until a scant few meters rested between him and the opening of his den, he heard a sound of scuffling. Soon after, a voice went out with it.

"Oh, this doesn't smell at all!" it seemed to complain, its tone scratchy, high-pitched, and clearly male. "But no matter; a little stench and it'll be _perfect_. And what's this? Who would leave _this_ lying around? It's so shiny, hee-hee! Oh, the fool who left these out surely wasn't thinking straight, hee-hee-hee!"

Warwick's brow furrowed and his lips raised, exposing his teeth. A growl began to rumble within his throat as the individual within his home went on speaking, giving off a sour huff as it uncovered something else. It squeaked out, "Honestly, some people have no decency to just let their food wither and spoil. This old meat isn't even covered in maggots yet! Ugh..."

With that, Warwick realized whatever manner of scavenger this was had discovered his cache of dried meat he kept away as rations in the small circumstance that he left him unable to hunt. He hadn't touched the stuff in so long that he had nearly forgotten it was there, but the fact that a stranger was defiling his belongings still infuriated him enough. Acting on this rousing bit of anger, he hastily turned the final corner and peered into his den. What he first noticed, standing almost directly in the center of his abode, was a short, gaunt, inhuman figure, his back aimed at the chimera. The little flesh of him that was exposed at this angle was enveloped in short fur that matched the color of the mold that commonly grew on sewer pipes, and a cloud of black flies buzzed around his head.

Extending from its rump was a long, dark, scaly, bandage-covered tail that twitched about every few seconds like a worm undergoing electric therapy. He was clad in the filthy remnants of what seemed like either a trench coat or waistcoat, but the sleeves it once surely bore had been gnawed off at some point another so it's scrawny, weedy forelimbs could poke through with zero resistance. Upon his left shoulder and arm rested a makeshift pauldron and gauntlet of sorts, both crafted from a scavenged bit of broken metal. A crossbow-like weapon was strung around his back, alongside what appeared to be a pair of fist-sized glass casks filled with sickly green fluids, but Warwick couldn't discern exactly what the stuff was. What he could detect more than anything about this unwelcome intruder was the unfathomably rancid odor it gave off, which to say was worse than the one it left behind in the tunnel, and almost caused his eyes to water the moment he caught a whiff of it in all its noxiousness.

"Hey!" he bellowed at last, his fangs gnashing together.

Its pointed, flea-bitten ears shooting upward in alarm, the rat-creature's body spun around, showing its face. Upon the back of his thin, long snout were a set of simple goggles, their lenses almost blurred to the point of translucence with the layers of unwashed grime that caked it. Within them, just barely visible, were a pair of beady, bloodshot eyes that practically glowed red. The ratlike creature unleashed an earsplitting shriek upon seeing what beast had discovered it sifting through its den uninvited. Fumbling with the materials it had already grabbed ahold of until they all spilled back onto the ground with a clatter, it then reached its bony, claw-tipped fingers for the weapon around its back.

After the being had grabbed it and began pointing it forward, it was much clearer to see that he device itself looked indeed like an old and worn-down, but still stable crossbow, powered by chem technology. Affixed to its rearmost part, right above the wooden handle and filled to its cracked brim with only the most noxious and green chemicals that surely ran it, was a glass reminiscent of an upside-down chemistry flask.

Unleashing its prepped arrow, a bolt shot forth with a hollow _twang_ of the bowstrings, its barbed tip visible in the low light, practically gleaming with the foul substances that saturated it. In that instant, the bolt hit Warwick, piercing through the flesh of his left shoulder.

It was a swift and dense pain, like that of a piercing bee's sting. While it seemed no worse than that, it was not something he was going to ignore. Warwick stepped back and quickly put his hand to the bolt, pulling it from his flesh. Taking just a quick look at it, he glared at its barbed tip, now also coated in his red blood alongside its venom and grime.

Warwick's next glance was shot back to the ratman. To his immense agitation, the string on his crossbow had automatically reset itself. Another saturated arrow, coated in just as many vile liquids and waste, was swiftly placed in the arrow track by its wielder. With a crazed laugh he launched it, then another and another, all shot with the poorest of accuracy to guide them.

Warwick leapt away the moment his newest foe starting shooting, avoiding the coming projectiles with his quickness. Running in circles for a moment, he found a large, empty metal barrel sitting on the corner of the den, and so ducked behind it.

"It's mine! It's _all_ mine! _I_ licked it!" the ratman cried out with another maddened laugh, firing a second volley of bolts at the sheltered chimera. As the bolts all missed or deflected off of the his cover's surface, Warwick looked again at the arrow he had previously been shot by, snapping the thing in two in his hand. Already he could feel the stinging poisons it injected him with festering in his bloodstream, but it was a minor pain that would surely leave. Grumbling in disgust, he tossed the broken bolt away.

Sitting there, he waited for an opening to arise. Just a single one, so that he could pounce on his enemy. Lo and behold, his opportunity indeed came, almost as soon as the current volley of bolts ended.

"Out of ammo?" the ratman said, apparently to himself. "Oh, wait a second... I'm sure I left a few more bolts in my-"

Taking this chance, Warwick lunged from his cover silently, catching the ratman off guard. With a single, sweeping swipe he hit the crossbow out of its thin claws, sending it sliding to the floor. The creature screeched in fear and tried to jump away as soon as it realized what was happening, but by then it was too late. Chasing him down, Warwick sent his left claw forth, grabbing the ratman by the scruff of his neck. With his prey caught, Warwick stood tall and looked at it in its red eyes, hoisting him a few feet from the ground.

"Please don't kill me!" the ratman cried in terror, lifting his arms up to shield his rodent face. "Please don't! I-I was only looking through this place for stuff to scavenge! I didn't know anyone a-actually _lived_ here!"

"Then what of the fool who left all of this trash here 'lying around'?" queried Warwick, his eyes resembling two red flames that seemed eager to feed the oversized rat to the fire. "Don't think I didn't hear you chittering with glee about uncovering my belongings. I know what you're about..."

The ratman lifted a quivering finger to respond, but failed to come up with anything to defend himself. He was caught in the blatant lie like his smaller, unmutated relatives in a mousetrap. Warwick raised his right claw to the creature, his metal claws extending in preparation to gut this loathsome, unwelcome intruder. Sensing his looming demise, the ratman threw his hands up in a panic.

"Y-you don't understand!" he squeaked. "I-i-if you spare me, I'm sure we can come to a-a-a m-more proper understanding! I'll do anything you want, _please!_ "

Warwick paused. A brow lifting, his aggressive stance began to falter. Lowering his readied claw, he eyed Twitch carefully and snorted. "Give me a reason not to kill you, pest. One _good_ reason..."

The verminous creature gulped. His forepaws coming against one another, the rat-creature tapped his index claws together in a most manner, evidently thinking of a way to worm his way out of his dire predicament. "Well... I... I like being alive. Does that count?"

The ratman shrugged innocently, hoping to receive a positive response. He gave up the when he saw Warwick's lip begin to raise in a coming snarl. "Okay, okay!" he squealed next, flinching away. "I-I know who you are! I heard you like to hunt awful people! Folks in Zaun say that you like to devour those who do wrong! B-but _I'm_ not evil. I just... do what I _need_ to do to survive. You can understand _that_ , yes? You can see that I'm clearly a poor, innocent person who's just trying to make a living, yes?"

"No."

The ratman flinched once more at the laconic response. "O-okay, if not that, then... I have something that you might get out of me. And I'm sure that it's something you _want_. You see, I... I-I can help you! I know some people you might like to eat instead of little old me..."

Warwick sniffed. "Like who? Do you see anyone who has committed heinous crimes? Who's done terrible things for selfish or... _sadistic_ reasons?"

"I see them lots of times when I'm running around in the sewers. They don't usually see me, though. But... if there's one thing I know about most of them, it's that they're definitely _bad_. Far, far worse than someone such as I _._ "

"In what way?"

The fearful rodent ceased his twitching for a second. "Hmm... well, they like to steal things _I_ want to steal, and I remember seeing a lot of their faces on these poster things that happen to wash through the sewers. You know, the ones that say there's a reward for their capture, or something like that."

"Anything else?"

"Yes, yes! They dump lots of things down here that I'm sure you'll want to know about. Trash, chemicals, bodies, you name it."

"Really?" Warwick hummed in a most intrigued manner, his grip around the mutant creature slacking. When he realized what he was doing, he was quick to reaffirm it. "How else do you know that they are among the type that I hunt?"

"I-I've heard them whisper about how safe they feel from time to time! S-safe from _you!_ It's true!" he squeaked, covering his eyes. "That's all I know! Please don't hurt me! I taste awful!"

Instead of taking a bite of the repulsive creature as it feared, Warwick asked, "What's your name?"

"Twitch," he replied. "J-just Twitch."

"You're a lucky rat, Twitch," said Warwick, setting him down to the cool floor but keeping his grip firm. "I may just have a use for you after all."

"W-well, assuming that it's within my powers, I, uh... just might be able to help, _heh_..." he snickered, feigning the loss of his fear, if quite poorly. "...What is it you want from me?"

"If I let you go, and you in turn find out about where these supposed bad folks dwell, then listen to what I say next: If you come back to me and tell me about them, I will not harm you." He let out a laugh that came out more like a half-snarl. "In fact, I might find it in my heart to _reward_ you for such assistance. Can you perform this?"

"Oh, yes, yes! That I can do! I can tell you _everything_ I know, yes!" Twitch instantly, almost eagerly started, as Warwick began walking with him closer to the entrance of his lair. "As a matter of fact, I saw some people that might interest you earlier today. They were in the back pipeline of Odd Kwinge's, not two days ago. It's a small bar north from here, in the area just below Dingy Street. I think. I found these two guys getting rid of three bodies wrapped in bags, talking about how they didn't want anyone to 'uncover more of their evidence'. I even heard one of them call the other 'Fat Gerald'. I saw them hanging around there twice before, and I bet my tail they live somewhere around it as well. I'm _positive_ that you'll want to eat them over me. That Gerald guy's even a plump, juicy piece of-"

"Shut up," commanded Warwick, the amiability in his voice gone again. Twitch shivered and did what he was coldly told. Huffing, the chimera regarded the oversized rat with a serious mien. "You heard what I said. All I want is reliable information. Are you up to this task?"

"If it means you won't kill me, then yes," was how Twitch answered, nodding his flea-bitten, rodent-esque head rapidly for a good five seconds.

"Then good." Warwick let go of Twitch's neck, dropping him to the floor like a sack of rubbish. Rubbing his paws over the scruff of his neck where the lupine beast had grabbed ahold of him, Twitch looked up to Warwick as he took a step back, giving the ratman a chance of having space to stand. "You're free to go. And do try to remember our bargain."

The mutant rat started dusting himself off before he asked, "How do you know I won't just run away and never come back? How do you know if you'll ever see me again? This is beginning to sound too easy to be true..."

"Because if you do try to scamper off and break this vow, I'll hunt you down before anyone else," he said, a large, horrific grin of shining fangs stretched over his face. "And you _know_ I can make good on that threat, don't you?"

Twitch silently gulped. "I do. Fair enough."

Warwick's glare hardened, then slacked. If this rat could discover and inform him of the more slippery criminals lurking like frightened children in the more hard-to-reach places, then as long as he was unwilling run off and try to escape his service (who wouldn't be too hard a character for Warwick to track down, given his stench), this serendipitous little opportunity had quite the potential...

"So... you'll work for me now, 'Twitch'? You'll find me these loathsome creatures who have been eluding me for so long and come back to tell me all about them?"

"I-I will."

"Then you have my earnest appreciation, 'friend'," he thanked, his grimace staying where it was as he flicked a paw at the rat-man. At this, Twitch knew that it was his time to depart, and he worried what would happen if he didn't take this chance before the one who gave it to him lost his patience. Warwick didn't have the chance to turn his back before Twitch picked up his weapon and belongings and scurried out of his den, his claws scraping loudly over the ground in his haste to flee.

* * *

 **Author's notes:** Hello again, my patient compadres. This chapter was delayed in part to college finals I had to study for in December, and also due to a little... _impact_ I felt from the big lore update they chucked as us. Granted, not all the stuff in the updates were bad. They even came out with a new music video! Props to Varus' new lore and the very unique, artistic take they had on that. Great music, great background!

As for the other part...

Soraka, apparently, had her own background updated as well. They removed her quarrel with Warwick, shortened her bio by about **everything,** and then did... _something else._ Part of me was happy, knowing that she finally got her chance in the spotlight; and part of me was sad when I first read about this, knowing that while it would modernize Soraka's character, it would also meddle with my story and the years' worth of lore it was built upon.

But what really got me was the 'big one'. They had the _**balls**_ to change Soraka's Astral Grove residence from being in Ionia... to _Targon_. Flipping _Targon_. You know... a champion whose design is blatantly based off of several themes originating from Japan and other parts of east Asia, such as the works of animator Hayao Miyazaki, and perhaps even the mythical Kirin (the Japanese unicorn version of China's mystical 'Qilin'), is now a resident of the big ol' Spartathebes of Runeterra (For goodness sake, her very name is the romaji spelling of Japanese 空香 "celestial fragrance"). Because as we all know, that style fits in _flawlessly_ with a society bearing an ancient Greek motif! I mean, I know Soraka's 'pre-fall' look does somewhat resemble the depiction of an ancient Greek maiden of some kind, as well as Targon somehow gaining a whole array of cosmic spacey goodies in their theme simply because of a giant star dragon and two epic star-bound warrioresses who worship the sun and moon, that's _all they're going with on this?_ She's not a satyr (which I know was originally men-like beings with horse ears and donkey tails), nor a faun, nor a nymph! A dryad, maybe, but that's because of a god-damned skin utterly unrelated to the lore! I could understand if they wished her to be a celestial being with ties to the other celestials with relations to Targon... but really? A _resident_ of Targon?

 _Sigh._

Well... Yes, I've recognized that League's made a decision to finally update Soraka's lore and play pinochle with her background. But given it's an excruciatingly poor, insipid, half-baked, stupid, and overall waste-of-immense-potential-what-the-hell-were-you-honestly-thinking-LoL-designers decision that makes as much sense as placing a screen door on a submarine, I've elected to wholeheartedly ignore it. Soraka is an Ionian - always has been, always will be. The writers behind League's modern day lore could at least recognize that aspect of her character. Don't get me wrong - they seem to be stellar at their job when they actually bother to make a champion's bio more than two paragraphs and a quote long. But from what I've seen with Soraka, and several other characters so far for that matter (What happened to all that good stuff with Garen and Katarina's complex relationship?), they're really scraping the bottom of the Graggy Ice barrel in that one pocket of their updating department. Now, I may find a way to get this all to somehow fit in with the new lore, but until then, I guess I'm rolling with the old lore.


End file.
